Alec Lightwood and the Boy Who Lived
by Not Jessica
Summary: Alec, Jace and Issy are busy enough without a whole new magical reality exploding in on their city. Unfortunately, no one told Harry, Ron and Hermione that- and they are fighting to contain an evil that could destroy them all. Mortal Instruments/HP Xover. AL/HP and more! Little plot, lots of headcannon, OH SO MUCH DRAMA. Rated M for all the right reasons.
1. Prologue

_Hello lovely people who clicked despite my not very good summary! Thank you! I'm a long time reader, first time poster, so please be nice. I've wanted to write this for a very long time, so do let me know what you think, I want to learn! If your thinking to yourself 'hmm not too much drama, not too much adventure, not too much in the way of sexy times-my filters must be set wrong', then never fear! New chapter coming very soon! I am not one to bury the lead, once we've all gotten through this prologue together I anticipate each chapter to be a queer utopia where everyone is busy having all sorts of adventures, angsty feelings and romantic interludes. If that sounds like your bowl of spaghetti- please read on!_

 **-Prologue-**

When Alec, Jace and Isabelle ran through New York, the city became their own. They were fast, fast, deadly and invisible, the way they liked it. Too fast, for Jace to think about how lonely he was. Too deadly for anyone to suggest Isabelle should retire to the kitchen. And invisible enough that no one would guess Alec's secret. They dodged cars, scaled walls, and leaped between buildings without hesitation. Somehow, for the three of them, it was only when suspended mid-air, between the roof of one building, and their target; the less-than-sturdy façade of the building opposite, that they felt really safe. Sometimes, between missions they would laugh, almost manically, as if even they struggled to process the elation they felt, such a sharp contrast to the oppressive order and tradition of the Clave, that dominated most of their lives.

Alec especially loved missions on warm nights, when all the Mundanes were out and enjoying themselves. More than the others, he suspected, he drank in his surroundings. His father had taught him to constantly observe, it was a crucial skill for any Shadowhunter (except, apparently, his siblings, who had more of a point and shoot mentality), and in a City like New York it also offered something else. Running down Christopher Street, or, increasingly, any street, he would see them; pairs of men, pairs of women, holding hands, kissing, looking at each other with the kind of love in their eyes Alec knew that he craved. He would see them coming and it would take all his energy not to shout; 'me too!' as he whooshed past, an invisible witness to their love. He was sure that one day he would slip up, the Shadowhunter illusion would buckle from sheer force of will and a gay couple kissing outside a bar would be alarmed to find that they are sharing their moment with a demon-blood soaked boy holding a bow and arrow, studying their every movement.

It was an unseasonably warm night when he first saw the boy with the feet. He and his siblings were scaling the Brooklyn Bridge to investigate reports of Downworlders who were forcing the bridge to shake in order to freak out unsuspecting Mundanes. He heard him, before he saw him,

'If I knew that quitting school to fight the forces of darkness was going to involve chasing Peeves to the ends of the earth, I'd have stayed in History of Magic,' the voice said. Alec quickly finished hoisting himself up under one the bridge only to see six dangling feet vanish with a crack, from one of the beams above. They left no trace of who they were, or of the Downworlder who had been spooking pedestrians.

When the three reported back, Alec gave an impassioned plea that the mystery was worthy of a new mission, to track down all six of the dangling feet and interrogate them about the disturbance on the bridge. That they could be a threat, somehow. But, no one seemed concerned about the incident; if Downworlders wanted to clean up their own Accord breakers, especially Accord breakers who seemed mostly interested in giving Mundanes a slightly weird day, rather than putting them in any kind of real danger, then more power to them. But Alec couldn't put the voice out of his head, it was like, it didn't make sense in his world. Sure, he had seen Warlocks disappear through portals before, but never just 'crack' into thin air. And sure, he knew that Downworlders had as much respect for national borders as you'd expect from anyone whose existence presupposed the straddling of two different dimensions and whose eternal life upset any philosophical nature of permanence, let alone the nation-state, but there was something about the boy's British accent that wasn't just foreign, it was otherworldly. And speaking of his voice, nothing he said quite added up. Sure, the things Alec witnessed everyday were ostensibly magical, but he just never heard them called 'magic', let alone thought of it as something that was taught in a school. What, did they have lessons about how to ride broomsticks and brew curses in bubbling cauldrons, too? And what, what by the Angel, was a Peeves?

Alec left the Institute for fresh air, with the admittedly optimistic hope of clearing his head. He was equal parts vexed and excited by those feet. Vexed because he knew these infatuations had to stop, because that was what it was, an infatuation. Despite what he had insisted to Hodge at the meeting, he wasn't remotely concerned about the warlocks and the Peeves disrupting New York's uneasy peace, he was infatuated, infatuated with a voice and a pair of feet. Alec sighed, that, surely was a new low. Yet, as his own feet pounded a familiar route, he allowed himself to entertain the part of him that was excited. Perhaps, just perhaps, those feet represented an opportunity. They were no Mundane feet, that much was obvious, but increasingly Alec was sure whatever they were, they were not Downworlder in the strictest sense of the word. Maybe they were just different enough to jolt him out of his misery. Maybe they represented entry into a kind of parallel world, where people learnt magic in a school, and could disappear in mid-air, where, and now Alec's imagination really ran away with him, people of the same gender loved each other, without fear of persecution.

Alec reprimanded his imagination as soon as he realised where he had allowed it to wander. It was silly, he had no reason to suppose that the three pairs of feet he had seen represented anything but a slightly eccentric group of warlocks. Even if they were from some kind of bizaro world, what evidence did he have to suggest that they were any more forgiving of difference then his own? It wasn't just silly, it was dangerous, if Alec was going to spend his life hiding his sexuality from the world, these flights of fancy would only cause him pain.

He found himself at Christopher Street, where he knew he would, he was outside Stonewall, but did not dare go in. He watched two women walk out, laughing uproariously, one, a taller woman with broad shoulders was dragging the other by the hand. They stopped to share a kiss, it was a sensual kiss, but Alec got the feeling they had only just met, they trod on each other's feet, and their noses bumped, they weren't used to being close like that. Alec thought about his first kiss, it had been on more or less that exact spot, only it had been twice as awkward and half as sensual, he had cried, it had been the first moment he knew for sure he was gay. He had left the men confused, and probably hurt, outside the bar doors and ran, ran and cried until he couldn't breathe, then fixed his face, returned home, and went back to work like nothing had happened. Alec was broken from his reverie as the smaller women screamed with delight, Broad Shoulders had clearly decided she couldn't wait for her any longer and had lifted the smaller woman up into a fireman carry and was running away with her, back to her apartment or a hotel Alec assumed, feeling equal parts happy for them and jealous of them. He listened to the sound of their laughter fading away. Soon it was indistinguishable from the drone of cars, the pounding of music, and the wail of sirens; the nature sounds of New York City.

Alec had an idea he'd follow a wail, nine times out of ten police were speeding towards the wreckage of a Downworlder they could never hope to apprehend, even if they'd been able to see them. But he was suddenly distracted by flashes of red and green lights;

' _Stupefy',_ he heard, followed by other words he couldn't make out, then a 'crack', followed by a voice saying

'Damn, are you okay?'. He stopped. He knew that crack, he knew that voice. He turned the corner and saw three people, around his age. There was a gangly red headed boy who was staring at a bushy-haired girl that was nursing a superficial wound on her face, and, there, closest to him, he was.

'Y-ou, you're the boy w- w- w-', Alec stuttered. They all looked up at him, surprised by a new comer, but strangely unperturbed by his shock and awe. The boy flattened his fringe compulsively and gave Alec a resigned look as if whatever Alec was about to say, he'd heard it a million times.

'You're the boy with the feet', Alec burst out. They all stared.


	2. Chapter 1

_Me again! Wow, well done making it to Chapter One! Just wanted to throw it out there, from now on I'm playing it pretty fast and loose with canon. I hope that doesn't offend anyones sensibilities too greatly. Speaking of sensibilities, this chapter (and chapters beyond) also gets a little blue, if that offends you feel free to click away, but I would add that the desexualisation of queer people is an endemic problem and before you look away to spare a thought for all of the queer people who spend their lives mapping their existence onto heteronormative_ _experiences, and keep this a safe space for people who are trying to counter this. Sorry for the rant! Please rate and review, as you can probably tell I'm a chatty Kathy so I'd love to hear from any of you! -Cheers!_

 **-Chapter One-**

'Um….' The boy said, 'I guess I am _a_ boy with feet. Can I help you?' Alec noticed all three were struggling to hide long wooden…Steles? Stakes? _Surely not wands_ he thought, perhaps his notion of broomsticks and bubbling cauldrons was not so far off. Suddenly, Alec was very self-conscious, he wished he was wearing anything other than what he was wearing, that his hair was cooler, that he could think of _something, anything_ to say.

'The Accords has banned warlock duelling, I could take you in for this.' Accept _that_! Why did he have to be such a square? Alec stumbled around for something more, more… well, something less _that_

'Who you calling warlock?' The red-headed boy said,

'And we weren't duelling,' said feet-boy. Alec suddenly got the idea that as a pair they were used to being caught doing things they shouldn't,

'I'm sorry,' said the boy, 'But who are you?' Was it Alec's imagination, or was there something behind that question, a curiosity that extended beyond indignation at being told off by a total stranger. Alec hesitated for only a second before reverting back into his default mode;

'Alexander Lightwood, Shadowhunter, New York Institute, and you three had better come with me, I have questions about a series of attacks of Brooklyn Bridge involving a- a- Peeves.'

The boy in front started to respond but was cut off by his red-headed friend snorting,

'A Peeves? Like there is more than one of that little bastard, you don't have a clue, mate.'

'He is also nothing to worry about,' the girl added, looking like she was doing some very fast mental calculations about how to handle this unexpected observer, 'we just had to send him back to Hogwarts, and Dumbledore was standing by to re-bind him to the building. We were just helping out because we happened to be in the area.' This answered exactly none of Alec's questions, but before he could follow up, the red head barged in again;

'What the bloody hell is a Shadowhunter, anyway? Sounds a lot like a Snatcher to me.' Again, before Alec could answer, he was cut off;

'Did you want to get a drink?', the boy was grinning at Alec.

Alec probably shouldn't have said yes. But, he reasoned, he technically already told the Institute about the three, and he was technically gathering intelligence, and, if he was really challenged on it, technically, a Mundane bar was neutral territory to conduct such an investigation. He probably shouldn't have been drinking. He hadn't planned on it. But _he_ bought him a drink, and if he was totally honest with himself, Alec didn't even hesitate accepting.

'I hope this place is okay, I don't really know muggle places,' he said,

'Muggle?' Alec enquired.

'No-Mag,' Hermione added, as if she was translating into something Alec might understand.

'No-Mag? He enquired again.

'You know,' said the red-headed boy, 'non-magical persons, persons ignorant of the world of magic?'

'Like Mundanes!' Said Alec, feeling like maybe, for the first time this evening he had understood something,

'Well that seems a little rude, and condescending, the muggle world is fascinating and complex and if you think that being born, or raised without,' the girl started,

'I'm sorry,' stumbled Alec, 'that's the local terminology, I guess,'

'Let's start with something simple,' the boy intervened, 'My name is Harry Potter, this is Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley. We are not muggles, those people you called Mundanes, who,' he added hurriedly, 'I think we can all agree are lovely, or at the very least as varied in loveliness as magical people.'

'Agreed.' Said Alec, unsure if he were more excited to know Harry's name, or relieved that the conversation was beginning to feel a bit more stable. He responded in kind, 'As I said, I am Alexander Lightwood, I'm a Shadowhunter, that is, a person who has, um, the ability to, um no that's not right, a person who is descended from Angels and has the capability to do a number of,' he guessed he better try his hand at their terminology, ' _magical_ things, and has been charged with keeping the peace between other, um non-muggles.'

'Oh like an Auror,' said the boy called Ron,

'No idea.' Said Alec, without missing a beat. They all laughed awkwardly.

'I'm sorry,' said the girl called Hermione 'but this is simply fascinating. It's like a parallel world, or rather, two hidden worlds, that have somehow sat comfortably on top of each other without anyone knowing. I guess seeing as we both share the same primary challenges, that is to say, keeping ourselves hidden from non-magical people and maintaining internal law and order, we have developed in strikingly similar ways. And we are all so adept that hiding ourselves, that we have been hidden from each other as well! Oh, we could learn so much from you! Can I ask, for a friend, do you have the Tooth Fairy in your world?' Alec grinned, he liked this girl,

'No, sorry, do you?'

'No she replied, but I had always hoped, I could have sworn when I was little…' She trailed off into a reverie and Alec turned his attention back to Harry

'So what actually is it you are all doing here?' He asked.

'Well…' began Harry. The conservation took a long time. Alec was constantly stopping them for clarification. Hogwarts? A school. Dumbledore? A person. But eventually he got the story. This Dumbledore had almost died last year, fighting a dark wizard called Voldemort (Alec had to stop himself chuckling at 'wizard'). However, when he had been saved at the last moment by another teacher total war had broken out. With both sides evenly matched it seemed there was no end in sight, and whilst the constant battle was waging, chaos reigned. The three, who for some reason they didn't fully understand, were forbidden from fighting this dark wizard directly, were permitted to leave school and help control this new state of near-anarchy. Their special assignment was to stop it from spreading. New York was a site of special magical significance and, as a highly populated city, of special vulnerability (Alec bristled at this, he had considered his team to be keeping New York a paragon of stability). They had been sent there to address any wayward dark person looking to cause trouble across the Atlantic and watch for any signs this dark wizard was looking to extend the theatre of war.

'But,' said Alec after this explanation was through, 'how could we not know any of this? We haven't noticed a rise in downwor-, I mean magical activity.'

'No,' said Ron grimly, 'But the muggles have,' Hermione jumped in,

'Well I guess from your…precision, that you have a pretty highly trained sense of how the local magical people and creatures behave in your area. Honestly, I expect that what we are dealing with is just different enough that it wasn't even a blip on your radar.'

'And,' Alec's heart gave a flutter as Harry jumped in, 'to be totally honest, what we are dealing with is not some kind of great overwhelming murderous evil, it's a lot of scumbags having a laugh at innocent people's expense and making a galleon on the side mostly. We sent a guy back to Britain yesterday who was selling bitting doorknobs to muggles.' Ron chuckled at that,

'Dad must have a fit when Willy Widdershin showed up on his doorstep. Like, I know he has got better things to deal with, but he always hated that guy. Not to mention,' added Ron, 'we've been doing a pretty good job of keeping everything quiet, there has been some real evil around too, lots of ex-Death Eaters,'

'Dark wizards, Voldemort's followers', Hermione offered

'Who are avoiding You-Know-Who but still dead keen for a bit of mayhem.' Ron finished.

'But we're off-duty now,' said Harry, earning some slightly surprised looks from the others, 'let's talk about something else, who do you do around here for fun?' Alec and Ron both chocked on their drinks in surprise. Harry suddenly look like he wanted to melt into the floor, he gave Ron a look that clearly said he was mortified that his attempt at a smooth line went down so poorly. Alec wasn't any smoother, but he also wasn't the sort to leave a pretty boy flailing;

'I'm single at the moment, your chaos has been keeping me busy, even if we didn't know why.'

The evening continued in a more relaxed fashion after that. Alec really like all three of his new friends. It felt like this other hidden world they inhabited fit him so comfortably. Much later Ron coaxed Hermione onto the dance floor, leaving Alec and Harry alone. Alec didn't get drunk very often, but when he did, he knew he a tendency to over-share, the deep and meaningful drunk, his sister classified him. Soon, Harry was hearing everything. The strict conservatism of his culture, and of his family. The utter impossibility of his ever coming out as gay. The pressure and expectation to marry. His loneliness. Harry, to his credit, listened with the kind of generosity and compassion that Alec had not learned to expect from his highly distractible siblings. He told Alec he could relate, if Alec was being perfectly honest Harry's family sounded like dragons even when compared to the very low bar his parents set.

'There is really no hope for either of us, is there?' said Harry, smiling. Then, to Alec's surprise, he added, 'Do you want to go somewhere? Maybe we could get some air?' Alec nodded numbly and they slipped out of the bar to the alleyway beside.

Alec opened his mouth to say something but his breath hitched when he turned and saw how close Harry was standing. Harry's eyes were soft, his mouth was slightly open,

'I hope you don't think this is too seedy,' he said, a hint of nervousness making his voice only more seductive, 'this war. Its changed things. I don't like to wait. Or to hold back anymore, if I can help it.' And with that, he kissed him, softly at first, then hard, Alec took a step backwards and allowed his back to hit the alley wall. He returned the kiss, and ran his fingers through his messy black hair. Harry softly bit Alec's lip and Alec gave up all restraint. He allowed his hands to explore the curvature of Harry's back, his strong hip bones, his, it had to be said, perfect ass. He pulled Harry closer and groaned when he felt his strong erection pushing through his jeans. This was not the first time Alec had been in a situation like this. Hasty experimentation had led him to this exact spot beside any number of bars. But this was different, this was no experiment. In his experiments he went limp, usually with shame or embarrassment and let the anonymous man take the lead while he examined, detachedly, miserably, what qualities had made he so irreparably gay. This was different. This was no experiment and Alec was not some self-hating lab rat. If his mouth had not been busy he may have shouted 'I'm definitely gay and damn happy about it', he didn't just know what he wanted this time, he trusted himself enough to demand it. He pulled Harry's face away with his strong, callused hands. Harry's eyes were still soft and seductive, whilst Alec had been enjoying a personal revelation, Harry had clearly been getting horny out of his mind. Surprised and the clarity of his desire, Alec pushed his hand under Harry's jeans, which elicited a moan, he stroked suggestively for only a second, before removing his hand and placing it on Harry's shoulders pushing gently. Harry's knees buckled as he unbuckled Alec' jeans pulling him out and taking him in his mouth with an expertise and greed that convinced Alec that this wasn't Harry's first time either.

They went back into the bar with an air that, to anyone sober enough to notice, could only be described as a walk of shame. Luckily, nobody was sober enough to notice. Alec spotted Ron and Hermione, both nearly passed out on an old couch, and insisted on taking them back to the Institute, this had been a reconnaissance mission after all.

This, Alec thought, is going to be hard to explain.


	3. Chapter 2

_Hi! New chapter here, hope you like it! Super thanks to my first reviewer too, ah! Very exciting! In answer to your question, at this stage I'm planning on avoiding Romoine, I have more interesting plans ;) Please keep them reviews coming!_

Alec was both stressed and excited by his overly affectionate walking partner on the way back to the Institute. Harry clearly hadn't lost interest in him, he rested his head on Alec's shoulder, kissed his neck, and kept reaching around and squeezing his bum at unexpected moments. None of which Alec had any kind of problem with. But as they got closer to the Institute he started to worry he had made a mistake. He didn't really know Harry, and he was still very drunk. Now he was taking this drunk stranger home to meet the family and Alec had no idea whether Harry would even try, let alone be physically capable in his inebriated state to remember to keep his secret. The stress of this question alone had sobered him up, but had clearly had no effect on the other three who were now roaring at the top of their voices what Alec thought might be their, frankly bizarre, school song. He could barely think over the din of _Hogwarts, Hogwarts Hoggy-Hoggy_ blasting straight into his ear.

'Right!' he said, his voice must have come out angrier than he had planned because they all stopped and look at him like naughty children, 'let's huddle up, its team meeting time,' they all obediently huddled close together, eyes still wide, less with childlike obedience and more with the enthusiasm of a cunning plan coming together. 'Now', said Alec gratefully. 'When we go in there there are a few things you need to remember',

'Ha! –hic- "there there"' sang Hermione, and Alec started seriously considering if a sobering up rune was worth the risk on this lot, they weren't _technically_ Mundanes….

'Okay,' Alec continued, 'when we go in try to imagine you're in um… the Auror offices, everyone will be very serious and get very cross if you behave poorly,'

'Ha', Ron interrupting this time, 'You have clearly never met Tonks! AUrors are such a bunch of-',

'You know what he means, Ron, like when you're around Mad-Eye,' "helped" Hermione, although as was now usual with Hermione's helping it made Alec more lost than when he started,

'Oh, well in that case you should know if I see any Ferrets around I'm going to be getting the hell out,'

'What!' said Alec, now completely frustrated with how quickly this pep talk had been derailed and now talking very quickly 'Look, I don't know what a Tonks or a Mad-Eye is or what you have against Ferrets I just need you to understand that you are going to be walking in as unknown factors to one of the most secure and highly alert buildings on the planet, how we behave will determine whether you spend the night in a bed or under observation in a prison cell, and,' Alec allowed his eyes to flick to Harry for the first time in a while here, 'it is also a highly conservative Institution, how well you keep my secret will determine whether I spend the night in my bed or chucked out on the streets, so the mission for tonight; Be Normal, got it?' They all now looked very serious, after a moments silence, Harry spoke up,

'Al-ex-an-der, we once help hide a famous mass murderer and a condemned escaped Hippogriff for two whole years, may they rest in peace, you – have – nothing – to – worry - a- bout,' he said, poking the tip of Alec's nose affectionately with each of his final words. Alec did not know why Harry had thought this would be a comforting fact. It wasn't.

They had been walking for a few more minutes when Hermione said, 'Eeep! I think I know how I can sober us up! Like we do with Hagrid. Ron, come here,' and with that she pulled out her wand and pointed it straight at Ron's face. Ron looked utterly unconcerned by this as she muttered some words Alec couldn't understand, and instantly a jet of water came out, soaking Ron. Ron looked shocked for a minute, spit out some water, and then said 'Wow, that totally worked!' Hermione turned on Harry and look as if she was about to repeat the process when Alec shouted 'Wait! What the hell am I going to say at the Institute when you show up drenched?' Hermione paused for a second, clearly thinking and then said,

'Got it!' She promptly turned back to Ron, said the same incomprehensible words and showered him with water head-to-toe, she then turned, clearly intending to do the same to Harry, when Alec shouted in sheer exasperation 'What?!' Hermione turned as if surprised he had failed to follow her logic,

'Well, now you can say we fell in the lake.'

'What lake?'

'Well I don't know, any body of water that's within walking distance of the Institute, I can do salt water if you think that would help? Harry, come here and close your eyes,' Alec looked on, resigned to adding this new ludicrous element to his already ludicrous story.

At least, he thought as they continued what now felt like a long march home, Hermione was right, it really did seem to have sobered both of the boys up. At the very least enough that Harry was now performing the same trick on Hermione, although Alec had to admit he didn't really know whether magic and drunkenness were as inversely correlated as he now hoped they were. Indeed, Harry didn't seem entirely sober as he looked up at him with a serious expression on his face saying, 'you are normal you know?'

'What?' Alec asked,

'Well, I know what you mean, and don't worry, we will all keep your secret, Mission Be Normal is a go, but you should know that you and I, we're normal. I've known you less than a day and have already heard you talk about your gayness like it's a freaky tumour on your brain that needs to be treated, or removed. Like you're an evil thing, outside of your own culture. Well, maybe that's how you feel right now, or how you've been conditioned to talk about it. But you should know that you're wrong. I've seen a lot of sick and evil people in my life, I think I know something about what it looks like. You know yourself, evil people don't. You love, evil people can't. I suspect that you are fabulous, and talented and absolutely one of a kind, but, in the sense you mean it, you're also normal, just the way you are. The aberration in your culture is anyone who would have believe otherwise.' Alec felt tears well up in his eyes, he went to kiss him, to show him that no one in the world had ever spoken to him as he just did, made him feel as safe as he just had, but as he leant in Harry tripped over his own feet and fell, rather spectacularly, into a rubbish bin. Hermione hadn't succeeded in totally sobering him up yet.

Finally, they reached the Institute. Alec resisted the urge to give them one last pep talk, although he did shoot Harry a pleading look that was met with a devastatingly charming, and comforting smile. As they walked into the atrium Alec felt a little guilty, he instantly noticed how hard they were trying to be serious and sensible. It turns out the Institute was more sobering then any fraudulent lake-dive. However, Hermione's hurried efforts to dry the three off them (clearly, now sober enough to remember slightly more useful spells) did little to help. Alec had set them up for failure, three soaked teenagers, one attempting to blow-dry the others with a magical stick, simply could not fail to stand out, and soon they eyes of Hodge, Jace and Isabelle were trained on the four with equal parts suspicion and confusion.

'Um,' said Alec, now wishing he'd thought less about how his three friends would behave and more about how he would explain himself to the other three people in his life, 'I found the people who got rid of Peeves.' This did not help as much as he had thought, and he hadn't thought it would help very much.

'Okay,' said Hodge, 'I thought we discussed that they weren't really a threat, why are they wet?'

'We fell in a,' Ron started, looked at Alec, panicked, continued 'an unidentified body of water,'

'They fell in the Hudson,' jumped in Alec, his brain was switching into gear now, he was a highly trained Shadowhunter who had been hiding his sexuality for years, talking his way out of this situation must surely be his niche skill, 'I was walking, I found them drinking and decided it couldn't hurt to interrogate them. I found out they are not at all like any warlocks we know. They also have information about an onslaught of danger to Mundanes that we have been missing, so I decided to bring them in. Unfortunately, as we were heading back, they, ah, fell in the Hudson River, which is why, why they are all wet.' He finished, rather lamely, but the story Alec, thought, was not altogether unsuccessful. And whilst he had been talking, he had to admit Harry, Ron and Hermione had sobered and dried up significantly. As such, they were looking at lot less like suspicious, drunk randoms that Alec had arbitrarily snatched off the streets. Indeed, they all now looked as if they understood the importance of Mission Be Normal. Hermione had pocketed her wand and was moving towards the suspicious Shadowhunters, her hand outstretched.

'Hello, my name is Hermione Granger, I am a witch working for Albus Dumbledore and the branch of the Ministry of Magic which has not yet fallen to the Dark Side. My colleagues and I have been charged with containing any proliferation of magical wrongdoing that may have spread to your city, due to the stress and disorder of the current Civil War.'

It was several minutes before Jace stopped laughing. In a strange way though, Hermione's chosen tactic of absolute honesty had worked, her speech had simultaneously sounded both ridiculous enough and serious enough that Hodge, Jace and Isabelle had all been prepared to sit down and hear the same story Alec had. After about an hour, they were all up to speed, and taking the newcomers seriously. 'Well Miss Granger,' said Hodge, finally, 'this has been fascinating, we will have to report to our superiors about this,'

'As will we,' agreed Hermione,

'But I feel as if a treaty of cooperation between our two groups could only be mutually beneficial,' Hermione hesitated at this, clearly weighing her words against what at this stage Alec could only assume to be the early onset of a hangover

'I agree also,' Hermione began, hesitating, then clearly deciding to back down from whatever she had been about to say, 'but I think perhaps it is not the moment for diplomatic negotiations, perhaps tomorrow?'

'Absolutely,' concurred Hodge, 'In the mean time I would be happy to offer you all a place to sleep in our visitor's quarters' At this Ron and Jace both reacted, Jace muttering something in Hodge's ear which to Alec's dismay sounded very much like 'wouldn't the cells be more appropriate,' and Ron something in Hermione's like 'Couldn't we just apparate back to the flat' Hodge and Hermione waved them both away.

'That would be much appreciated, thank you,' replied Hermione, Alec wasn't sure if it was his imagination, but he had the sudden feeling that Hermione's gaze had held on his sister for just a second too long. Nevertheless, they were given a brief tour of the facilities, which seemed to properly impress both Harry and Ron, provided with guest toothbrushes and guest pyjamas, and each shown to their rooms.

Jace and Isabelle eyed Alec as if they wanted to stay up and talk, but Alec deliberately ignored them and went straight to his bedroom as well. He flopped on his bed and massaged his skull as the effects of his own hangover began to set in. It had been a seriously weird night. It felt like two nights, the first ended when Harry had got up off his knees and kissed Alec more passionately than he had thought possible, the second had begun when they walked through the doors of the Institute, and was now, mercifully Alec thought as he closed his eyes, ending. It was at this precise moment that his sister snuck in a body-slammed him so hard he nearly spewed all over her. Alec groaned as she proceeded to curl up next to him and she whispered in his ear; 'you smell like alcohol and sex, spill.'

This, Alec thought, was why he loved his sister. When he started telling her the full story about the events of the evening, he had thought it a chore, satiating his kid sister's love of drama. But Alec soon found his pounding headache easing, something… important… had happened tonight, and as he told his sister he began to allow that fact to sink in. Eventually, he started to express the small hopeful thought that he had been playing around with all night; 'I don't know Iz,' he began, 'but it just feels like… like you know how I've always felt there's no way in the world I could ever come out, ever be happy? Well it's like, perhaps what these guys are bringing is a whole new world, a world where I could. Does that make sense?' Isabelle didn't answer, she looked like she was happy for him, but in a bittersweet way, Alec thought he knew what she didn't dare say, that Alec's hopes were up in a way they had never been before, that if somehow this all blew up in his face, they both knew, it could permanently destroy him. There was a safety in the feeling of hopelessness that Alec had allowed himself to fester in for his whole life. When a vaccine is administered the patient receives a small dose of the disease, so the body learns to fight it. That had been Alec's life up to this point, anonymous encounters inoculating him against the toxicity of living his truth and being ostracised for it. What if Harry, and the world he represented, made Alec immune to the vaccine, leaving Alec exposed and vulnerable? If he was being honest, this scenario wasn't unlikely, surely, one day Harry would return to his world and Alec would be left, again, alone, unable to sooth his pain as he once had. Yet on the other hand, he could not help but let the other scenario play out in his head, the one where the trio stayed, he and Harry fell in love, told the world- perhaps a marriage- and their skills as a crack evil fighting team precluded them from the discrimination that coming out had previously promised.

Alec's reverie must have turned into a dream, he woke up, judging by the pre-dawn darkness, several hours later, to Harry softly shaking him. Alec started. 'You can't be in here,' he whispered, 'Iz-,' but he stopped, Isabelle, he now realised must have snuck out, leaving him to sleep,

'It's fine,' Harry whispered, 'I saw her sneak past my room ages ago,' Alec barely had time to wonder what Isabelle had been doing in the visitor quarters, Harry continued, 'I just wanted to apologise, being in the closet is scary, I was drunk and I feel terrible for making you think I could expose you like that and,' Alec noticed Harry looked genuinely regretful as he continued, forcing out the next words very quickly 'if you aren't ready to admit something to yourself, or if you were just experimenting, or if you are doing the whole self-hating thing and want to pretend I never happened then just tell me I won't make it weird, or out you or anything.' Harry forced himself to meet Alec's gaze, Alec, lost for words, took Harry by the collar, pulled him close and kissed him, ferociously. He was trying to convey in one action all the hopes and fears and commitment he was willing to offer Harry, this boy he hardly knew, if Harry would let him. In lieu of saying the gamut of emotions and fears he had been processing that night, Alec leaned into Harry's ear and whispered in a gravelly voice, a little surprised by his own self-assuredness, as he had been in the alleyway,

'if I wasn't worried about someone hearing us, I would take you right now and fuck you until you screamed the Angel's name,' Harry broke away looking sheepish, but horny,

'I, ah, actually kind of know a spell that could, ah, do some soundproofing,' He walked over to the door and did the spell, then Alec did him. Twice. They fell asleep in each other's arms, Harry only sneaking away once the sun had properly risen, parting with the sort of kiss Alec and imagined Romeo leaving Juliette with after their illicit night of romance. He treated himself to another couple of hours in bed, half asleep, half awake, revelling in post-coital bliss, trying not to think about the possibility that the stars were as crossed for he and Harry as they had been for those Veronese lovers.


	4. Chapter 3

_Hey, sorry for the slow update! I hope you feel its worth the wait, this is my favourite chapter yet, please let me know what you think. There is a lot I haven't decided about with this story and I'm hoping you guys can let me know what works and what doesn't! Thanks x_

 **-Chapter Three-**

The state of bliss that came from the moments following great, intimate sex was not something Alec had experienced before. He realised as he was lying there, pleasantly tired half-dreaming, half- awake, that he had never had sex in a bed before. He laughed to himself at that rather sad thought, that was the type of scandalous personal fact anyone he knew would have assigned to Jace, not the demure, rule-following older brother. Honestly, he could see why most people preferred their sex in bed, he had none of the usual bumps and bruises that came from a hurried tryst in an alleyway or a toilet, he felt comfortable. As a rule, Alec didn't like being naked, he was somewhat ashamed of his body, and for no good reason had always considered excessive nakedness lazy, a sign of personal slobbishness (this was an assessment he only held for himself, the nakedness, or semi-nakedness, of others was a vital resource to a closeted teen with no internet connection). However, in this moment he felt like the bedsheets were an extension of his skin, he relished the way the fibres felt against those sensitive bits that were usually covered by coarse clothes. He felt comfortable enough to touch himself as well. Not in a sexual way, in a more casual, intimate way, as he lay there he was running his fingers over his chest, occasionally stopping to follow the line of a rune, tattooed across his path. Intellectually, he knew this heightened state had to do with the oxytocin his brain had released, the endorphins rushing through his body, the nerve endings that Harry Potter had made stand to attention. Yet, he couldn't bring himself to reduce how he felt to mundane medicine, it felt too different, it felt…spiritual, or even, maybe…magical. Alec laughed to himself at this, the next time he was alone with Harry he should probably ask him if he had put some kind of sex spell on him, somehow he suspected not but, he thought, as his mind started crawling out of this previously calm bliss, it wasn't like he really knew Harry. And with that, his bliss was over. He barely registered as he started putting clothes on, his body went so profoundly into action-stations auto-pilot that he barely even noticed when he went to grab his bow and arrow. He stopped himself just in time and turned instead to a mirror.

'Don't freak out,' he told himself out loud, 'You know enough. He could've outed you last night, and he didn't, hell,' he added, 'he could have killed you last night and he didn't'. This was not the comforting pep talk he promised himself when he had turned to the mirror two seconds ago. He reattempted.

'Okay, you know, well you think you know, he won't out you. Just go out there, and try not to be alone with him until you have gotten more information.' His heart dropped a little at this somehow even less peppy pep talk. _All_ he wanted to do was to be alone with Harry, forever if possible, he hated that he couldn't trust himself, that he had to engage in tactics and duplicity just to get to know a boy he liked. But doing stuff you don't want to do is part of being a Shadowhunter, Alec knew that. He knew it better than most. So he did what he always did, got dressed, composed himself, and started acting straight. This is what it means to be in the closet. Alec had always thought that the metaphor of the closet was something of a misnomer, in his literal closet, alone, he could be himself, to hide one's sexuality is to be on a stage, under a spotlight inhabiting a role you are biologically unsuited to play, where any slip-up is noticed by an audience hard-wired to judge any challenges to the validity of their heteronormative assumptions. It was a role Alec knew he played less than perfectly.

As he walked on stage Alec saw Hodge, conferring with what he knew must be Clave members from Idris. As he closed the library door, he heard a stern middle-aged Clave member say, 'We hope we haven't made a mistake entrusting this to you, Hodge, you have served your time well and you know this territory better than any envoy. Please, try not to start a war with an unknown world before Robert and Maryse get back from their mission.'

'I'll do my best, Mrs Starkweather,' replied Hodge, with what Alec knew to be forced politeness, 'The guests are organising their own diplomatic proceedings as we speak, I anticipate this strange, new, venture going quickly and smoothly.'

'I'm glad _you_ have such confidence in your abilities,' another Clave member added stonily, 'report back this time tomorrow. Goodbye.' Before Hodge had a chance to respond, the portal had been closed. He pinched the bridge of his nose before turning toward Alec with a wry smile.

'They don't like to admit it, but the Clave know they are no good at diplomacy, it takes someone like me, someone, on the fringes,' he added with a bitterness Alec rarely saw from him, 'to have these kinds of conversations, they require flexibility, humility and understanding. And, well, the closer the are to the Clave, the better you are at shutting those things out. Although you,' he added, pointing a playful finger at Alec, 'seem to have done a pretty good job last night, despite being on the fast-track to Clave ascendency. Perhaps there's a little weirdo hidden in you, too. Don't let them stamp that out. It's already helped you discover an entirely new race of magical people. Who knows what it might yield next.' Alec did not know how to respond to this, he had almost never heard Hodge speak this candidly, or this bitterly about the Clave, and his comments about Alec made him feel exposed, how had his relationship with Harry Potter already caused his mask to slip? Luckily, at that moment the door opened, and Harry, Ron and Hermione came in. Alec got the distinct impression from the look of relief in their faces that they had been wandering around in random rooms looking for them for some time.

'Mr Hodge,' said Hermione, who was clearly the leader of the trio, from what Harry had said she was the most intelligent and most driven of the three, it made sense that she was the designated representative. 'I have spoken with our contacts back in Britain, and Amelia Bones, representative of the True Ministry of Magic, will be apparating to New York in a few hours to join us in discussing this new situation.' Hodge interjected,

'Yes, I have just finished a meeting with my Government, and I will be leading the talks on the behalf of the Shadowhunters, the Clave, that is the name of our Government, wishes me to offer permanent space in our Institute for you three and any other negotiators who will join us.'

'That is very kind, thank you,' Hermione replied, she looked relieved, Harry had told Alec about the flat they had been staying in, it sounded less than idyllic. 'We discussed it last night, I hope it was okay I borrowed one of your fires,' Alec made a mental note to ask what she meant by that later, 'and I anticipate Mrs Bones proposing to you that Harry, Ron and I stay on in New York in a semi-permanent capacity to deal with the threats that come from both of our worlds. I thought it would be good to let you know in advance what we thought of the situation.' Alec tried to contain his joy, Harry staying permanently, working alongside him, he could hardly believe his luck, Alec's reverie was broken as Harry started to speak, 'As we begun to explain last night, our people are living through a civil war, for reasons it would be best not to go into I, I mean we, have been asked to stay clear of the frontline,' Alec's heart broke as he saw the anger, and perhaps also shame in Harry's eyes, he then chanced a look at Hodge, it was clear Harry's last words had struck a chord with him, 'this war has been going on sometime and it has become clear that if we don't take steps to intervene the collateral damage that has come from global unrest, will make any victory against the Dark Side virtually meaningless.'

'As such,' Ron cut in now, with what looked like a forced professionalism, 'if you can come to an arrangement with Amelia we would be happy to stay on and lead the magical arm of this alliance, with the important, ah, caveat that you don't misinterpret this alliance as any kind of power you have over us, we will maintain our autonomy and if we need to return home, to help there, we will do so, we have friends and family who are in danger every day, they will always be our priority, you have no say over our movements.'

'Anyway,' said Hermione, clearly trying to lighten the mood, 'that's how we feel, we just thought we should let you know, before you went into negotiations, oh,' she added, as Hodge sat down to pensively sip his tea, 'Amelia mentioned that she anticipated the talks going on for a few days, so she is bringing her wife Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank as-,' Hermione stopped abruptly, Hodge had apparently choked on his tea. Alec's heart sank. Hermione continued, more slowly, 'as many of us are uncomfortable leaving our loved ones in this time of unrest.' Hodge looked like he was processing his first diplomatic challenge in his head very quickly, 'I'm sorry Miss Granger, for my reaction, but there has not been a, a one of those um, people, sleeping under the Institute roof well, as far as I know, ever.'

'Well you had at least two last night,' snapped Hermione, Alec nearly fell off his chair, surely she wouldn't, she didn't seem like the sort of person who would out him to prove a point, but then again she was clearly more angry than he had ever seen her, her right hand had snapped towards the belt loop which held her wand and Alec swore he saw actual sparks shooting between her flyaway strands of hair. 'Harry and I are both "those people",' Alec audibly sighed with relief, and a little surprise. 'I can't believe I have to say this but, apparently I need to be clear.' Alec thought he saw Hodge shrink ever so slightly in his chair, 'But what Ron said before about maintaining our autonomy of movement extends also to our culture. We. Do. Not. Discriminate. Based. On. Difference. Of any kind. In fact, I have spent most of my adolescence, and the beginnings of my adult life fighting with every fibre of my being a group of people who do. The evil we are fighting believe in purity, in binaries, good blood, bad blood, as a gay person of colour with two muggle-born parents I represent the thing that Lord Voldemort seeks to eradicate from this earth. I have been ridiculed and tortured and had almost every foul thing you can imagine said to me. By the other side. In our world, the side of good defines itself by tolerance and diversity, in this we believe we are afforded strength. If I have made the wrong judgement of your world, if you are a world that does not believe in those things than we should cancel these talks, Mr Hodge, because that means you, are what we are fighting against. And I assure you,' she added, threateningly, 'I am a well-practiced fighter.' The room was filled with a stony silence, Alec didn't dare look at any of them, after what felt like an age, Hodge spoke,

'We will be happy to host Ms Bones and Ms Grubbly-Plank. And I assure you that whilst our world may be more, _traditional_ than yours, we are not your enemy.' With that rather lame sounding concession, the door opened and Jace and Izzy burst in.

'We got a demon horde!' said Jace, not even trying to hide his excitement, 'Load of them in Queens, not a clue what they are but they are getting nasty and I want to get them dead!' His eyes flushed with the kind of mad intensity that Alec, and he guessed all the girls, found insanely attractive,

'Can we come?' Alec looked over, and nearly fell of his chair when he saw Harry had the exact same look, 'we can get you to Queens in about two seconds and I promised Alec last night I'd show him what I could do,' he winked unsubtly at Alec, Alec didn't care, it was his turn to say something,

'Lets go, there is no point even engaging in diplomacy until we know how these guys fight,' _or whatever I need to say to get Harry on a mission_ Alec thought to himself

'Fine,' said Hodge, still, Alec thought, looking slightly scared of Hermione, 'but I take no responsibility for any injuries you three get on the field, clear?'

'Clear!' the three chimed, they were raring for a fight, tripping over their feet in their haste to leave.

Alec had heard the three talk a lot about apparition in passing over the previous night, but they had all completely failed to mention how unpleasant it was. Even Jace had paused immediately after they appeared in Queens with a 'CRACK', and bent double with his head between his knees for a second.

'Sorry,' Hermione said to Izzy, as Izzy pressed her head against the cool bricks, just, Alec thought, to remind herself what solid was, 'It's better if you are focused on where we are going, not how sick you are about to feel so I decided not to warn you, you get over it once you've apparated a few times, I promise. Any way I apparated us a few blocks away from the demons so you could recover for a second.'

'Fanks.' Jace mumbled from between his knees. They all pulled themselves together and started walking, slightly wobbly, towards the danger. Alec jumped up and down, readying himself for his second rush of adrenaline of the day. Hermoine was talking rapidly to the others,

'First, we need to establish that our spells even work on demons, I don't really know what our equivalent to an inter-dimensional being is, our magic could work fine, but it could be like trying to cast a spell on a dead person you know? A totally different kind of magic. Obviously, if it doesn't work, we have to focus on protecting ourselves and the others, I'm talking shield charms mostly of course. If our magic does work, then its go time, you know the drill, make them tiny, tie them up, turn them into a ferret, whatever, go to town, lets show these _traditional_ "angels" what we're made of' Harry shot a grin at Alec. Alec couldn't help but feel that they were both stepping into their element. As they rounded the corner they saw a group of huge demons, maybe twelve feet high, looking at the people scurrying straight through them the way Jace looks at a buffet.

'They just look like trolls,' said Ron, sounding relieved, 'Just stick it their nose, eh guys?' he said as he pulled his wand out a,t the ready. The others laughed, Alec bristled with irrational jealously at the inside joke he was not party to, as he drew his bow,

'Okay,' he called, 'Harry, Ron, Hermoine, you do your thing, whatever you can do to help, that would he great but stay out of the way of Izzy's whip, it's not the fun kind,' Jace and Izzy both looked at him with surprise at that last remark, but he continued, 'Izzy, Jace, attack formation, Jace, you were right, I don't know what they are, but I know they are demons, shoot to kill.' And with that the attack began, at first Alec barely noticed what his new magical friends had been doing, so focused he was on covering his siblings, and launching his own attacks. But after a few minutes he chanced a look. What he saw was amazing. The three were wielding magic as a method of total control over the situation, Hermione had bent a street lamp to clamp one of the demons to a building, Alec didn't know who had done it but another one was writhing against ropes that Alec could see were become progressively tighter, and at that moment Harry and Ron were tag teaming, intermittently hitting another of the demons with debris whilst the other protected the mundanes from the chaos of movement that was happening around them, levitating falling chunks of concrete, and moving cars further down the road.

'Whatcha Alec,' Harry cried as one of the last remaining demons descended on him. Harry yelled something that started with 'L' and the demon stopped in its tracks, frozen like a board, Alec took the chance to square a shot straight into the demon's eye and with a whoosh of his arrow the demon was obliterated into a million tiny pieces. They both breathed heavily, staring lustily into each other's eyes. How good, Alec let himself think, must after-battle sex be? Whilst Alec had been momentarily distracted Jace and Izzy had gone through and dispensed with all of the demons the three had magically restrained.

'WOAH!' Jace yelled, clearly the adrenaline Alec was feeling was mutual, 'That. Was. Amazing!'

'We,' added Isabelle, pointing at Hermione, 'are buying all of you drinks. Now.'

The six were all standing very close, there was this electricity running through each of them. It was like they had met before. Like they were always supposed to meet, cosmic soul mates. It was like the team was complete. And they kicked ass.


	5. Chapter 4

_Hi, new chapter, I hope you like! Please let me know what you think via reviews, I genuinely don't know where this is going, the characters have already gone in directions I hadn't expected. I'd love to know what you thought!_

 **-Chapter Four-**

Harry, Ron and Hermione could certainly drink, Alec thought to himself. One round of drinks at Taki's had turned into, well, he had lost count at several. Jace and Izzy were delighting in taking turns asking the trio questions about their world, and asking them to say random words in their foreign accents. 'Is there a spell to set fire to farts?' Jace asked.

'Say 'toilet', Izzy jumped in,

'Oh oh, is it true the toilets flush in the opposite direction there?', cut Jace again, Hermione gave an amused happy hiccup and replied,

'It's Australia where the _toilets_ flush backwards, although I don't think they actually do,' the table had all cheered at the use of the word 'toilet', and Ron had broken through,

'We were in Australia a few months ago, a bunch of ex-deatheaters had set up camp in Ballarat, Australians have the _best_ slang, so good, like, we're here to get something done, is "we're not here to fuck spiders,"' the table burst out laughing, 'and, and,' Ron continued, 'this one wizard we met, whenever he was really hungry he'd say,' Ron brustled up and put on his best Australian accent;' "I'm hungry enough to eat the crotch off a low-flying duck",' more uproarious laughter,

'Oh,' Hermione jumped in, 'and they call toilets "dunnys", and, and, "root" means sex,'

'And blow jobs,' chimed in Harry, 'they call "gobbies"' the table laughed again, and Harry used the hubbub to throw Alec a sultry look, and mouth the word 'later?', Alec nodded, winked and then noticed that the conversation turned.

'Speaking of "gobbies",' Jace began, wagging his eyebrows at Harry and Hermione. Alec froze. 'We should congratulate you two on apparently breaking the Institute's 'no-homo' streak,'

'Well,' Hermione said, 'if that Hodge thinks there has never been another gay under his precious roof until now, he is delusional, I may not know no much about your world but anyone who says, "there are no gay- whatevers, Shadowhunters, goblins, Australians" are always kidding themselves, and usually gay themselves.' She added, as an after-thought. Even Alec laughed at the thought the Hodge could be holding some repressed desires, he had to admit the idea had more than a little merit, on a good day Hodge looked like he was repressing a full lump of coal up his arse waiting for it to turn into a diamond. Alec knew he came off as repressed in the same way to a lot of people, perhaps it wasn't the craziest thing Hermione could have said. This interesting train of thought was cut off by another more alarming thought, that speculating about gay Shadowhunters may not be the safest line of conversation for Alec. At that moment Ron jumped in again,

'I mean everyone's a little bit gay, right?' The Shadowhunters at the table almost visiblly bristled at that pronouncement,

'Well I'm not!' Alec jumped in with probably too much vigour, he saw Harry's face look a little hurt out of the corner of his eye. He also saw Ron roll his eyes,

'Well it's not like I'm saying I'm secretly wishing that Harry is going to whisk me away and blow me in the toilet over there,' Harry and Ron laughed heartily at this, the others a little more hesitantly, 'I'm just saying the sexuality is a spectrum, I've felt straight as a bean poll all my life, but I'm not going to close myself off the possibility of that changing, why would I?' The table fell into a silence that was, Alec had to say, more relaxed, than awkward. He noticed his sisters chewing her lip, clearly processing something.

'Well,' said Alec, trying to break a tension apparently only he felt, 'if we are getting to the deep-and-meaningful portion of the evening, we are going to need more drinks, and it's my round.'

Alec went to the bar, his hands shaking slightly, he made a point to not make eye contact with the bar tender, he needed a second for his brain to catch up with his heavily beating heart. Wasn't this what he had wanted? If you had asked him, Alec would have said that a group of trusted people casually challenging strict notions of sexuality, possibly warming his brother and sister to the possibility that being out and gay could be a totally viable life, was exactly what he had needed and wanted. Hell, they were every disruption to the system that Alec had hoped they would be. But, it was all going so fast, only a few days ago Alec had been convinced that the closet was more or less his permanent reality, and now, every conversation seemed to move dangerously close to an accidental outing. He had never paused to ask himself if he was ready for that, because he had never thought he would have to be. A large part of him thought that he needed all this to slow down, close up the small gap of vulnerability that Harry Potter had already made, and revert back to the rule following, repressed Alec. But, as he chanced a look back at the table, another small, but more hopeful, part of him, let himself imagine walking back to the table with their drinks, sliding next to Harry and casually fitting himself under the arm that was perched along the edge of the booth, to continue the night absent-mindedly pushing Harry's hair flat, playing with that hole in his jeans, just being comfortable together. He imagined that it would feel relaxed in a way Alec had never felt in public before, that it would feel warm, and safe, and just be fun, fun to be that open with his friends and his siblings and the strangers around them. The small, hopeful part of someone's psyche is usually the incorrect, unrealistic part, but, Alec decided, he couldn't live with himself if he forgot it completely. Alec was brave, he fought demons and downworlders and did things most teenagers literally couldn't dream of, he was going to be brave again, he told himself, he was going to let this play out, he was going to let this small, hopeful part live a little longer.

'What'll it be, love?' asked the beautiful bartender with a third eye in the centre of her forehead and a third arm, still serving the customer before him. _I guess it'll be love_ Alec thought to himself.

Alec couldn't quite believe he was alone in Taki's with Harry. Hermione and Ron had handled e erything with the kind of skill that only two best friends could and had orchestrated a situation where both Jace and Izzy hadn't beat an eye at the thought of retiring to the Institute and leaving Alec and Harry to one last drink. About an hour after the four had left them, a white snowy owl had flown into the bar carrying a scrap of paper that read; _take your time, no one is waiting up, Ron ;)._ As soon as Harry had taken the message the bird had grabbed a chip out of his hand and flown away, upon seeing the dirty looks on the bar tender's face, Alec said,

'You know, if you all had phones he could have just texted you,'

'Why?' Asked Harry, seeming genuinely confused that anyone would consider owl-post an ineffective method of communication. Alec, in that moment deciding to also not mention their aversion to ball point pens, changed the subject.

'This is nice,' he added, daringly, 'it almost feels like a date,' Harry laughed,

'Yeah, like we should be drinking milkshakes, and I should be twirling me hair,' Harry put on a dow-eyed expression and started trying to twirl his short hair, 'and at the end of the night you'll walk me home and give me your pin, and the next day at school everyone will know we're going steady.' They both laughed at this, but Harry's eyes were twinged with something like sadness, and he said, 'you know, I really like you, I know its hokey but I'd actually really like to do all that stuff with you, when they others where here, it took all my energy not to reach over and push your hair behind your ear, or I don't know,' Alec noticed Harry's cheeks going red, 'something couply like that, it just feels so right. It's hard not to touch you in that way in front of people,' Harry was talking to the bottom of his beer glass now, as though determined not to look at Alec, 'I know I'm being silly, we hardly know each other, I don't want to scare you off by saying all these things, I swear I don't usually get like this, usually casual sex is enough for me, but I don't know. It's just like there's something about you, like, I feel as if you could change things for me.' Harry chanced a glance up into Alec's eyes after he said that, and then hurriedly flicked them back to his glass, as though willing himself to finish what he had apparently been dying to say. 'I'm not asking you to come out, that's not fair and from what I've seen, it might not be safe. This, what we have been doing, can be enough for me, I promise, but maybe one day soon, you'll let me apparate us to some random city where nobody knows us, maybe Berlin, I think you would like Berlin, and we can go on a date, and hold hands, and kiss in public and, well, all that stuff.' At that, Alec took Harry's hand under the table, and Harry's eyes met his, looking hopeful,

'I'd like that,' said Alec, and the two of them smiled.

The rest of the evening was the fun that Alec had been craving. They played truth or dare, Harry summoned a pack of cards and they played a few disastrous rounds of Gin Rummy, they invented drinking games. They sung at a volume that earned them another dirty look from the bar tender, especially when Alec began leading the bar in a group sing along of 'American Pie', followed by Harry going solo and booming a very off-key rendition of 'Auld Lang Syne'. After a few hours, Harry, nervously suggested they went back to the flat that until recently he had shared with Ron and Hermione.

Surprisingly, apparating whilst drunk was much easier, the trip was actually the steadiest Alec had felt in several hours. They had apparated straight into Harry's makeshift bedroom, which was furnished with only a single, very old looking photo of two people that Alec assumed to be Harry's parents. Harry leapt up from the bed, and was clattering around in the kitchen nook, clearly preparing more drinks. He came back with a cheeky, abashed look in his eye, holding a bottle of vodka and a glass that had maybe two centimetres of juice in it.

'It seems, making drinks is now beyond my capabilities,' he explained.

'Don't worry about it,' said Alec, surprising himself at the lustful gravelly tone that his voice had taken, 'I'm not thirsty'. The tone that Alec's voice had taken on, had somehow reached Harry's eyes, also. Harry threw the bottle and glass away (Alec barely registered that they had magically neither broken, nor spilt) and walked over to where Alec was perched on the bed. Harry placed one thigh on either side of Alec's and perched himself on Alec's knees, he pulled out his wand and ran it down Alec's chest, each of his buttons popping open as the wand passed over them. Harry then tossed away his wand, and grabbed Alec's sides as he kissed him, passionately. Harry pulled away, and whispered in Alec's ear, tongue flicking his earlobe between words,

'I don't want this to be like the last times, I want to take my time with you. I want you to tell me what you want. I want this to be the single best lay of your life. But first, let me tell you what I want, I want to fuck you and be fucked by you, I want you to fuck me until I scream Merlin's name, and I want to fuck you until you scream my name'. Harry's hips shifted forward, and with the combination of his words, his tongue and his jeans rubbing against Alec's crotch, Alec nearly came right then and there. He took deep breaths, and composed himself enough to answer. Even in his lusty haze Alec realised this was the first time anyone had ever asked him what he wanted. In a second he thought of all the time he had made up fake fantasies about girls to appease Jace, all the times he had flirted with girls, forcing every line trying to make himself want them, he thought his anonymous encounters with men, where he had been too nervous to even speak, let alone ask. In that moment he felt more autonomy, more confident, and more turned on than he ever had in his life, and he responded;

'I want to take off all your clothes, I want to fuck you in the exact position we are in now, looking right into each-other's eyes, while I'm inside you I want to suck on your nipples and feel how the muscles in your abdomen move,' Alec couldn't believe he was saying all this, and yet he felt not an ounce of shame, it was like his whole adolescence of loneliness had been preparing him for the moment when Harry, bloody, Potter would ask him what he wanted. He kept going, deeper into his own fanasties, that he was now sharing for the first time. He was far too horny and drunk to think about the fact that his dreams were literally about to come true, 'when I'm finished, I want to suck you off, then, I want you to tie me up, on my back, I want you to bight me and suck me and leave me bruised all over, I want you to claim me as yours, then, then I want you inside me, I want to feel every thrust,' a decade of repression was flooding out of Alec, 'I want to feel you lose control and fuck me however the fuck you want.'

Harry followed every one of Alec's requests, and then some. Alec had only one thought before they fell asleep in each others arms, that this is what sex was, it wasn't defined by who did it, or what was done, it was acting on a primal need to be as close as physically possible to someone. In that exact moment, with Harry's arms snaked around him, their legs tangled, Alec felt at one, at peace and at home.

Luckily, they were both very early risers. They both woke up around dawn, and Harry apparated them to the Institute. Alec snuck them through the wards and they parted with a kiss to their separate rooms. Alec fell down on his bed, beginning to feel the fear he always felt when he took a risk like the one he took last night; what if someone recognised him, and saw them, what if Jace saw that last kiss, if Hodge saw them sneaking in at five in the morning? As if to complete the waking nightmare, there was a knock on the door, it was Izzy, 'Alec, wake up,' she said, 'The Clave are here.'


	6. Chapter 6

**-Chapter Five-**

Harry had barely sat down before Hermione was knocking on his door.

'Grubbly-Plank and Amelia are here,' she said. Harry leapt up almost straight away, as keen as he was to process his incredible evening, any reminder of home felt like a veritable treat. 'Same clothes as yesterday? You harlot!' Hermione teased as Harry quickly threw a jumper over the ratty t-shirt he had now worn through 24 hours, an epic demon battle and the single best sexual experience of his life.

'Are you wearing robes?' Harry asked, suddenly wondering whether wizards had diplomatic protocols for meeting previously unknown multi-dimensional worlds.

'Maybe later,' said Hermione casually, 'I don't think we will need to follow the Diplomatic Convention of 1409, we don't even have any ceremonial Elk's for starters.'

'What's an Elk?'

'A creature from the last unknown multi-dimensional world we found. It didn't go well.' Harry chuckled, he really didn't know what the point of he and Ron was sometimes, Hermione took every challenge and question in her stride, he felt really honoured to be her sidekick.

'Come on, I'm excited to see them, I wonder if they bought anything from home, I would kill for some Honeydukes,' said Hermione, Harry chuckled again, he knew for a fact that Ron had written to Amelia telling her that after assessing the Shadowhunter representatives he determined Firewhisky to be the most appropriate gift, and could she please bring along a few spare bottles for any post-treaty festivities. They walked out into the hall, Harry really liked the Institute, the design of the building had none of the medieval opulence of Hogwarts, but it did have the same air of mystery, of a limitless building of infinite discovery. As much as constantly getting lost made him feel more than a little silly, it also reminded him of his First Year, back when getting told off by Professor McGonagal was the worst thing that could happen.

As expected it took them five wrong turns to get to the meeting room, but luckily, on the third wrong turn they had run into a significantly more stressed-looking pair of witches. 'Professor!' called Harry excitedly, the witches turned, looking relived someone found them, and as lost as Harry felt. Professor Grubbly-Plank, as Hagrid's chief rival, had never been Harry's favourite teacher, but she was a good woman, and she was from home, and that was enough for him. Amelia Bones, on the other hand, once playing a crucial role in getting him out of a very serious, although totally unfounded, trial, had always occupied an affectionate place in Harry's heart. 'Amelia,' he said, shaking her hand. Their relationship had matured so much since the day of the trial, although it real terms it had not been so long ago. War, Harry figured, did that. It had made an adult out of him, and a rebel out of Amelia, the old divisions of teenager and Wisengamot member seemed superficial, a relic from a time that they both found difficult to remember.

'Potter!' responded Amelia, 'And Granger! It's so good to see you safe.' Amelia had developed the habit of ending her greetings in this manner very recently, Harry had noticed it before they left for New York. War may have erased any distance between them, but Harry and Hermione were still the exact age her niece Susan would have been, had she lived. Grubbly-Plank (Harry never could bring himself to call a professor by their first name) squeezed Amelia's hand and said;

'We're glad we ran into you two, we are more lost than a Banshee on St Patrick's Day, and we are supposed to be meeting the, ah Clave any minute,'

'The Clave are here?' Said Harry, thinking instantly of Alec and wondering how this may affect him.

'Yes, we found out last night,' said Hermione, 'I guess they didn't think Hodge was up to it after all, which reminds me,' Hermione added, with a sour look on her face, turning to the witches, 'I don't know how much of this is an all-Shadowhunters thing, or just a Hodge thing, but you should be ready to cop some pretty conservative attitudes, his eyes nearly popped out of his head when I told him he was already hosting two gay people and could expect two more.' The wives looked at each other in a bitter-sweet way, as if they regretted but were not altogether surprised by what Hermione had said,

'We are old women,' said Amelia, 'we've heard worse.'

'We have never heard worse,' Harry overheard Grubbly-Plank bristle not ten minutes later, slamming a door behind her. She had stormed out of the meeting room, and Harry was not surprised. Through a pair of extendable ears Harry, Ron, Hermione, Alec, Jace and Isabelle had heard the kind of tirade of homophobia that the former three had only ever heard from the Dark Side. Harry could see Alec was barely controlling his hurt and fear, struggling to stay strong on front of his siblings, it was all he could do not to reach out and touch his hand. Seconds later, Amelia came out of the room also. Harry, Ron and Hermione were hidden under Harry's invisibility cloak, the others, something called a cloaking rune. And they silently watched as Amelia tenderly took her wife by the wrists and whispered to her. It was actually beautiful to witness, two people so in-sync that they anticipated every emotion. Harry couldn't hear what they were saying to each other. He couldn't imagine what Amelia could say to make what the Clave had said okay, but he also didn't want to, it was too intimate to be spied on.

A Latin phrase Hermione had told him about came into his head, as he was watching the pair process how they could be strong in the face of such hostility and wilful misunderstanding; 'contra mundum'. It didn't translate into English very neatly, something like 'against the world', but throughout human history it had come to represent the dissenting minority defending themselves against an unfeeling world. St Athanasisus evoked it when he defended his faith against the Alexandrian majority, avant-garde poet Alfred Kreymborg wrote;

'Contra mundum

There is one sanctuary

That is never shut—

To you.'

Causing a small-scale riot, when it was published. Evelyn Waugh wrote his most tragic romantic hero, Sebastian Flyte on the same terms, with the promise between he and the protagonist, Charles Ryder 'you and me, contra mundum'. That, Harry felt, is what he was witnessing. After some time, Grubbly-Plank replaced her monocle, which had been dangling from her robes, and with a parting kiss, Amelia left her in the hall to return to the meeting. Grubbly-Plank began to walk away, back to where their room was.

'Let me know how it goes,' Harry whispered to the others, he ducked under the invisibility cloak and followed her.

Harry hung back for a few minutes before knocking on her door, pausing to wonder whether talking to an ex-student is really what she felt like now. In the end he knocked softly, figuring she could pretend not to have heard it if she preferred. However, to his intense relief, she opened the door almost immediately.

'Hello, Potter, come in' she said. She looked tired, and Harry felt a pang of sympathy. 'I assume you were listening?' She asked, as she busied herself conjuring up a table of tea and biscuits.

'Ah,' said Harry, unsure whether to confess,

'Amelia and I assumed you would be, we figured it would save us having to relate the whole thing back to you anyway.' Harry grinned the sheepish grin of admission.

'I just wanted to check you were okay, after, all that,' he added, by way of explanation. Grubbly-Plank gave a long sigh.

'We had a feeling the reception may not be the warmest when we were shown to our room last night,' she gestured at the beds, two singles, 'but I have to admit that its always jarring to remember that not everywhere is as tolerant as our world. Amelia and I always found that whenever we went into the muggle world when we were young, and now we encounter it often when we hear and see Dark Side propaganda. I just don't think I'd really thought through what it meant, to negotiate and reconcile with people like that. That's why Amelia is the politician and I'm the school teacher I guess, if anyone in one of my classes had said anything like that I would have pulled a Moody and turned him into a ferret,'

'Yeah, I recall,' Harry chuckled. It was a memorable class the day Malfoy had tried his hand at some homophobic slurs. Grubbly-Plank hadn't turned him into a ferret, perhaps she thought once was enough, but she had 'accidentally' let one of Hagrid's rogue blast-ended skroots chase him into the Forbidden Forest. They both chuckled at the memory. Memories were so important now.

'Do you think we will be able to stay?' Harry asked, nervously thinking of Alec. Grubbly-Plank narrowed her eyes.

'That,' she began, 'is the first time you haven't leapt at the possibility of returning to England, what's keeping you here?'

'Nothing,' said Harry, too quickly, 'I do want to fight, you know I do Professor, but if I can't, I, I, um, like the weather here.' Grubbly-Plank elected to ignore the tissue of lies.

'Amelia is determined that you do stay. Even in peacetime the discovery of another world is no small thing, in war, well, we have to make sure that our mess doesn't get innocent people hurt, that's as true for muggles as it is for these Shadowhunters. Even if I'm not fully convinced they are totally worthy of that protection.' She added darkly.

'Some are.' Harry assured her.

'Aha,' responded Grubbly-Plank, 'so it's not a what keeping you here, it's a who.' She paused again, deep in thought, 'it can't be an easy life, growing up gay in this world of theirs.'

'How do you know it's a Shadowhunter?' Harry asked quickly, suddenly nervous he had said too much, but Grubbly-Plank only shrugged,

'Shadowhunter or muggle, what I said stands.' Harry relaxed, but couldn't help but ask the question that had been playing around in his mind ever since he first kissed Alec Lightwood;

'Say he was a Shadowhunter, do you think, do you think he could ever, you know, come out?'

'I don't know the answer to that any better than you, only he would know that. But from what I saw today, it would be hard, I wouldn't be surprised if they had formal laws criminalising it. Then again, pride is a kind of power, when people are in the closet they tend to believe that to be out is to be vulnerable, and in a very real sense it is, but it also gives you power, it says "you can't control what I say and do, you can no longer make me feel ashamed of who I am, I have taken that from you," just one person coming out can be a powerful thing. If nothing else, it's a lot harder to hate something when you see it in a person you love. These conservative societies, there is often a lot of love in them too.' Grubbly-Plank surveyed Harry severely through her monocle, 'the most important thing is that it's his choice. When someone is outed, or pressured to come out, a lot of that power goes away. His choice in his own time.' She leant back in her chair and removed the monocle, her face relaxing, 'Do you still have that beautiful bird, Potter?' Harry relaxed, too. They talked about Hedwig for a while, she had been, Harry found out, one of her favourites, 'Such personality!' she said, 'and such care for you, remember that time I helped fix her wing? Would not stop hounding me until she was better, and the second she could fly again it was straight back to you.' The conversation turned this way and that, the old days at Hogwarts, what Tom, from the Leaky Cauldron was up to (apparently an attempt to home-brew Butterbeer went badly wrong and he was recovering in St Mungos), and Quidditch. It was almost as if the war wasn't happening, as if Harry wasn't exiled to New York, as if he was merely an ex-student who happened to run into an old teacher.

Harry always felt slightly guilty, forgetting the war. There were many who didn't have that luxury. But it was nice, and if he was honest with himself he also knew it to be one of the few things that kept him sane, stuck over here, in relative safety, protecting his Side from that evil, Voldemort part of his own body that even he did not understand. But for the first time, he began to think he could give himself permission to forget. What he was doing, uniting the Shadowhunter and magical worlds was important, if he could just stay, stay and help this new world, maybe he would mean more to his world, then a baby whose parents died saving.

And, he privately thought to himself, that was not his only reason for staying. He was quite sure, that what he was feeling, was love, love, even, at first sight. As the days passed he became less sure that, if asked, he even could leave New York, and Alec behind. He had been sitting with Grubbly-Plank for hours, but now he was making his way to his room. He was thinking about Alec, and about what Grubbly-Plank had said, about power, and taking his time. Time. Harry still couldn't believe it had only been a matter of days, Alec had turned from hot one-time hook up, to someone he maybe loved, someone, he secretly wished, would come out for him. He had to admit he felt a little disgusted with himself for that. To want someone to derail their life for you, on a hunch that a three-day relationship might be something more, that was not the love that Harry had learnt about from the selfless people in his life, like his parents, who gave up everything for him. He got to his room, without fully realising what he was doing, he took a moment to congratulate himself on having the route to his bedroom, apparently, memorised. However, when he looked up he was surprised to find the door to his room open.

Years of war and danger had left Harry warry, and his hand was ready to grab his wand as he walked through his ajar door. But it immediately fell when he saw who it was, it was Alec. He was sitting on Harry's bed grinning.

'You're staying!' He said, as soon as Harry came in. Harry's heart skipped a beat, partially because he had not expected them to come to an arrangement so quickly, partially because Alec so clearly wanted him to stay.

'I can't believe it! I thought they would be debating terms for days!'

'They are,' responded Alec quickly, 'but they think that whatever happens its best to have their people here, and when the Clave heard about all the big evil you guys are fighting they agreed!'

'That's amazing news!' said Harry, using his wand hand to magically close the door and the other to draw Alec by the neck into a deep kiss.

'I've been thinking,' said Alec, 'about us,' Harry's heart sunk, was this when it ended, when Alec decided he could no longer handle the risk Harry knew he represented to him?

'I know its soon, but I think I'm falling for you.' Harry didn't exhale, something that beautiful had to be followed with a 'but', and sure enough, 'but, if you are going to be here long term, we should probably talk about what this can be.' Harry tried to remember his professor's words; _in his own time._ 'I can't come out.' Alec started, Harry knew this but, it still hurt, 'you saw what it was like in there, being a Shadowhunter is my life, I can't lose everything, not yet, anyway.' They continued talking like this for hours. They let themselves imagine year in the future, versions where they stayed together, version where they separated. They talked on the small scale too, who knew, who could know, how they could keep their secret from everyone else. Most importantly they decided that Harry would not be pulled into the closet, he was a proud gay person, he could not make a step into the Shadowhunter world a step into the closet. Besides, they figured, maybe what the Shadow World needed was some positive gay role models. When it felt like they had analysed their relationship from all possible angles, Alec said something that Harry still hadn't anticipated he would have the guts to say.

'Harry, I love you, and I would really like to be your boyfriend.' Harry surprised himself at the strength of the emotions that welled up inside him when he said those words, he said them back, and they enjoyed another passionate kiss. Although this time the passion was laced with something else, a kind of intimacy that was usually reserved for the kinds of couples that have been together forever, that have no shame and hold no secrets from each other. It was totally intoxicating.

They broke away, and Harry was first to speak. 'I feel like flying,' he said. Alec looked at him, it was a look Harry was learning to recognise, where Alec couldn't tell if he was being serious,

'Can wizards, ah…'

'With a little help,' Harry jumped in, 'feel like sneaking out with me?' Alec agreed and together they slipped out of the Institute and prepared to apparate. Alec told Harry that he felt his was getting very good at it by now, Harry hadn't the heart to point out that all he was doing was holding onto him and making sure he wasn't sick at the end. He was even beginning, he said, to like the CRACK sound that accompanied the movement. This time, the crack led them to a wide, open field with impossibly, magically, tall trees at either end.

'Where are we?' Alec asked,

'The south of France,' Harry replied, 'Ron's brother and his wife own this place, but they are based in Britain for the moment'

'Is it safe, should I rune up, just in case?'

'It's safe. As soon as the war began we had a family meeting and decided we would all need a place to get away to sometimes, flying is good for that, so Fleur volunteered this place. We covered it in all sorts of magical protections, I can't even say where it is, other that the south of France, like I literally can't, my mouth won't make the words. No one other than us can apparate here, or even walk in, and if we, or somebody who thought they knew where it was, missed, even by a centimetre, we'd be permanently splinched.'

'Splinched?' Alec asked, Harry explained, and tried not to feel guilt about failing to warn Alec of the risks of apparition sooner.

'Its hard to protect big places, your magic needs to allow for all sorts of exceptions' but because it's just for the Weasleys and Hermione and I, this may be one of the safest places in the world. Anyway,' said Harry, glad to move on from the technicalities, and keen to get Alec's mind off splinching, 'I've been thinking about this for a while. Our magic works on your demons, creatures other than wizards can fly brooms, even some squibs can. So I reckon, Alec Lightwood, if you'd like to, you can probably fly.' Harry's heart leapt when he saw the look of joy and excitement and disbelief on Alec's face. They walked over to a rickety shed that stored a small collection of old Cleansweeps, battered Quiddtich set, and; 'my Firebolt!' Harry loved holding that broom, his opportunities were so rare. He told Alec his history with the broom, and he really tried, Harry thought, to understand. Harry handed Alec one of the Cleansweeps and they walked back into the middle of the field.

Alec was not a natural flyer. Harry had not really expected him to be. However, after about an hour he managed to hover several feet above the ground, and with some encouragement even managed to fly a jumpy lap around the field. He was nervous, but Harry could tell he was enjoying himself. He loved Alec's laugh, he could listen to it forever, and when he suggested they try throwing around the Quaffle, he was delighted to find that even ten feet in the air, Alec had excellent aim and a strong throwing arm. Privately, Harry suspected, that if their roles had been reversed, and he was the one who was not born with the innate ability to fly, he would not have taken to it as quickly as Alec had. With that said, he wasn't done with Alec yet. They leaned forward and lowered their broomsticks to the ground and Harry asked, 'now, do you really want to fly?' Alec nodded immediately, 'then get on!'

Alec climbed onto the back of Harry's Firebolt and Harry kicked off, hard. It was a little slower with two people, but Harry's precision and the Firebolt's strength more than made up for it, soon they were fifty feet above the ground, and Alec was whooping with joy.

'Hold on,' Harry warned, and they zoomed through the stadium at top speed, taking sharp turns and loop the loops, Harry even showed off his Wronski Feint, although he didn't think Alec really understood the rules of Quidditch enough to appreciate the utility, or the skill of the move. After a little while they came back down to earth again and fell in a heap of laughter onto the grass. Harry let himself enjoy the feeling of Alec's chest moving up and down on the side of his cheek as he caught his breath. He slid a hand up his shirt, not in a sexual way, just so he could feel him better. 'I wish I got a cool tattoo every time I learnt a spell,' he said playfully, tracing the lines of an intricate rune Alec had on his right hip bone.

'Maybe we will have to go to a mundane tattoo parlour when we get back,' Alec suggested.

'Do you think a couple of runes would impress your parents?' Harry asked, meaning it as a joke, but he felt Alec go a little stiff.

'I wish I could introduce you, I'd love to show you off,' replied Alec, a little sadly,

'Maybe one day,' said Harry in a comforting voice, 'and if not that's okay, you'll never meet my parents either.' There was a prolonged silence, 'bit of orphan, dead-parents humour for you there,' said Harry, breaking the tension,

'You are so grim!' Said Alec, grinning, and then, after another pause, 'do you remember them at all, what do you think they would have thought of, ah, you being, you know?'

'Gay?' offered Harry, 'I mean I guess I don't know. I don't remember them, but I've seen them.' Harry took a deep breath, 'in our world, there are these creatures called Dementors, they suck, like literally suck, all the happiness out of you, when they get close I can hear the moment my mother died.' Alec inhaled sharply at this, a kind of protective instinct for Harry, Harry continued, he had a growing sense that this was something Alec should hear, and maybe even would understand, 'At first, it was horrible, it used to make me pass out, but now, it makes me feel kind of powerful. I think I'm a witness you know, she sacrificed herself for me, that deserves someone baring witness. When I think of that voice, that horrible screaming, now, mostly, I think, she loved me unconditionally, I could have grown up gay, a goth, a total douchebag, hell, probably even turned to the Dark Side, and I know all she would have seen was that baby she was willing to die for.' Harry couldn't believe he was telling Alec all this, he hadn't even told Ron and Hermione in so many words, it felt like for the first time he was speaking to someone who might really hear him. He continued, 'but, over the years I've seen other things. A teacher of mine went to school with my parents, and I saw one of his memories once. My father, he was a great man, but in that memory, I saw that he could be cruel, too, unforgiving of difference, almost obsessed with being popular and liked. If I'm really honest with myself, sometimes I wonder how someone like that would have handled a gay son. I mean, it's not like your world, he wouldn't have said or done anything bad, but I worry he would never have accepted it, you know? I can imagine the man in that memory privately hating how it looked in family photos when I bought a boyfriend home, or trying to force me to be more masculine to prove something about himself, stuff like that, little things, all the time reminding me that I was a disappointment to him. Then again,' Harry finished, 'I can't know, so most of the time I tell myself they would have loved and accepted that part of me, and they aren't around to prove me wrong, so,' Harry shrugged, unsure how to end such a massive admission.

'I'm sorry you never knew them, they sound like they would have been fun to hang out with, and your dad, I'm sure he was just being a dumb teenager, it shouldn't ruin how you feel about them' said Alec, softly, wiping salty tears that Harry hadn't noticed dripping from his eyes. 'I want to see your world, one day, after this war of yours is over, I'd love to see a Quidditch match!'

'I'd love to take you,' said Harry, happy to change the subject to happier things, 'I'd love to show you everything about my world, the Burrow, Hogwarts, Diagon Alley, all of it. It's a beautiful world, in peacetime.' Harry spoke a little longer about the world he had left behind, it was so nice to remember, and Alec was always appropriately impressed when Harry told him all of the amazing things he missed. Eventually they got back to Quidditch, explaining the rules in more detail than he had bothered with before, Harry got up and showed Alec the Snitch from the Weasley's set and began letting it loose, catching it just before it flew out of reach. He let it fly away a little further every time, and eventually he got on his broom and continued his game whilst he talked to Alec from the grass. He had to admit, he was showing off, showing off in much the same way his father had once by the Hogwarts Lake. Perhaps, Harry thought to himself, it was because he was experiencing the same kind of love his father had all those years ago. And that kind of love made you a moron.


End file.
